DRIVE into eastern Europe and your chances of being killed in a road accident rise steeply, says the latest European Union-wide comparative accident figures from EU statistical agency Eurostat. The EU’s worst blackspots are Latvia at 752 road accident deaths per million car registrations, Romania (749), Lithuania (571), Slovakia (507) and Poland (476).

Leave the EU and enter membership applicant Turkey and the risk is even worse – at 820 road accident deaths per million registrations.

Compare this with the UK – using the most recent complete data set (2004) – and these figures are starkly focused.

In Britain, the risk is just 121 road accident deaths per million registrations, only bettered by Sweden at 117 and – oddly – Malta, at 61. In almost all cases, western Europe is safer than the east: the Netherlands has 126 deaths using the same ratio, speed limit light Germany 129, Finland 159, Luxembourg 170, even aggressive motoring Italy is just 175.

  • To view a PDF of Eurostat’s findings, click here.